We Didn’t Start the Fire

Billy Joel

Cite This Source

We Didn’t Start the Fire Introduction

This is not your typical Billy Joel song. There’s no uptown girl or piano man—just a rapid-fire list of events and names from 1949 to 1989. Not everyone loved it. Blender called it “one of the worst songs ever” and compared it to “a term paper scribbled the night before it’s due.” Still, the song managed to sit on top of the Billboard Hot 100 for two weeks and was nominated for two Grammys.

So is this what happens when high school dropouts try to write history? Or did Joel do a pretty good job of summing up the events surrounding the first 40 years of his life? You decide.